This will be the last article and post for a while.
Besides a three-month moratorium last year, I’ve written and
posted articles continually since before Facebook; over ten years ago. Nearly 7,000 articles
later I’ve learned so much. It’s been a major way how God has interacted with
me — to the sum of 30-hours per week for those 10-plus years.
But this isn’t just about the writing.
It’s about something more fundamental. There are imbalances to
correct.
Like many of you I’m imagining, my life’s revolved around using social media, and it isn’t just the posting of articles; it’s the following of a
plethora of other stuff — stuff quite frankly that takes me away from God.
There are a million and more distractions from God, so it’s not just social
media, but social media has become all-consuming, as the fear of missing out
(FOMO, look it up) rides roughshod on the heels of my hurried modern life.
But there’s more to it still. The carnal concerns of consumption
have overcome me too much over the past five or more years. I used to have a
high degree of self-control regarding my diet. It’s been a while since I’ve
been in that place, and given I’m deep into the ‘dangerous decade’, that is ages
44-54, I seriously have to create the changes necessary to ward off heart
disease and Diabetes Type II, etc. If even 10 percent of my writing time went
into exercise I’d do the exercise required to get and keep fit.
And still there’s more to it. Food and writing and social media
have become comforts; and to some degree, idols. The average person may not think
that, but I think that’s what God thinks, when they’ve become comforts I’ve routinely
gone to. I need to once again be weaned from these comforts. It’s all a bit too
convenient, and an irony, that I can write things to bless others when the very
process of doing it can at times undermine my own walk with God.
What if God wants more from me? He certainly does! To seek Him
more. To be fit and stay alive as long as possible for my family and so I can
serve Him as well as possible. To get prepared for what is coming. To be a
better husband and father. To be more focused. God certainly desires a
revolution in me. I only have the one life. Once I’m gone, I’m gone. For my God,
for my wife, for my children, and for those people God wills for me to serve. I
must seize the day.
Writing is certainly one way God can and does use me, but it’s
not the only way. Besides, Jesus isn’t the kind of King who will graciously
allow me to put the cart before the horse like I have. Writing can’t be allowed
to be an idol. Jesus desires true allegiance. So, I’m putting it down for a
time. And it won’t be the last time this problem will arise.
It’s possible that this little piece might be refined over the
next little while as I endeavour it to be a truthful record of where things are
at.
Writing can only happen if it brings glory to God, and it can
only resume once other factors of balance have been restored.
The social media must go, at least for a time. If it can’t be
solely a tool for God (as far as I’m concerned) then I have no use for it. Social
media is a counterfeit for true connection, yet it does connect us and many of
us would never know each other without it. This is not about criticising a
platform that has been a kind of home for twenty-percent of my fifty-year-old
life.
This leads to the intent of writing this kind of thing. It’s
only fair that I let people know what I’m doing in case people wonder ‘what’s
happened to that guy who posted daily and now no longer does?’ Also, in hammering
a stake into the ground, this kind of article helps me keep myself to account.
God needs to make it clear under what parameters a resumption is to take place.
To the person who has taken the time to read this, thank you. I’m
grateful that you’ve waded into this with me. I’m thankful for your prayers, as
many of you are in mine.
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